I hate to think that a child genius created this thing. My Lincoln would tell me stories about how Lisa solved algebra when she was five, and then put together a working chemical solution at six. Even once he said she got a Nobel peace prize. I thought he was joking. 

Though she's made our tech by helping stabilize The Covenant's plasma weapons formula and created our very own network channel for us to communicate discreetly. That's why buildings like the Solis station exist, after all. However, her greatest achievement has to be this machine, and yet, why does it seem like it has been held together by duct tape? 

Pieces start shaking loose from the hold, smoke starts filling the air around me, and two of the wings hang by their thinnest pieces. I can deal with the smoke, only at the cost of its engine scraping off bits and pieces of itself and throwing them into the dirt. Takes an hour to stop it from doing so. 

It gets even better when I look at a few notes she left showing me the inner workings of her glorious child. My eyes might as well have been reading Latin. I didn't need a few pieces of paper to tell me how to frame an engine. Luckily, this machine comes with a blow torch instead of an extinguisher. 

I began twisting the iron bolts and then torching the side panels that refuse to stay on. The blow torch must have been loud since I don't even hear the approach of her shadow, but I do hear her voice.

"Watcha doing?" She asks, her voice as innocent as I remembered it to be. 

To think she was holding back her tears the last time I saw her and now; she looks at me like I'm crazy. Similar to their Lincoln, she's almost an exact copy of my own. Even sporting her signature bright red cap and navy-blue overalls. The only thing that's different is instead of red underneath, she wears olive green.

"Lana," is all I could utter to her.

"Yep, that's my name though how did you know that?"

My brain begins to slowly drip down from its cage of a skull. For what feels like an entire moment of silence she waits pleasantly twisting her shoe into the grass, with her eyes remaining tweet full.  Should I tell her the truth only because she wouldn't understand, or should I keep up the lie? It's already hard enough to lie to my Lana, but now I got to lie to a whole new one. My teeth grind when coming to a compromise.

"Oh well, you just remind me of a girl named Lana I know, that's all." My face couldn't buy into the words, though at least she does.

"Hmm, is your Lana nice too?" she asks with an alive-struck tone.

"Ah yeah, you bet. She's quite the courageous and dirty little one if you ask me."

"That's good to hear. I wouldn't want to be associated with a Lana mean and nasty." Her cheeks start to glow and her eyes shine when they finally see what I'm doing. 

"Ooo you're welding something?" Her words become sweeter than chocolate candy. "Can I do one part please?" 

The way she begs weirdly enough reminds me of Joltxs, however, he could never master the puppy dog's eyes. 

I smile and toss her the shortest piece I can find. It's a fragment fallen from one of the sides, it's so small it can fit inside the palm of her tiny hand. I then slowly hand her the torch. She almost falls backward trying to hold it. 

Five seconds is all she needed to have that thing stick like skin to bone. To compare, it took me ten seconds for a slide. Even in this reality, her skills in welding are something to talk about.

"Wow, that's pretty impressive there Lana. You got some hands."

"Thanks", she says while twiddling her thumbs. "I've been practicing welding for a while now, though I've never seen something so gigantic. Did you make this yourself?"

I chuckle softly before responding with "Let's just say a friend built this. I'm just maintaining it." She has no idea how much I want to take credit.

"That's so cool." She pauses for a moment tilting her head to my right." Did your friend make that on your arm too?"

I remain still, the story I just made is so obvious, yet my mind chose to stick with Lisa's costume county fair contest. As I tried to explain my convoluted story, the shine inside her eyes starts sparkling glitter. Admittedly that makes me feel a bit better. I can tell she was going to ask me more, until the smell of smoke breaches my lungs, twisting my nose as if it were broken. 

"Ooo, can I help you with it please?" Just the excuse she needed. The last words that roll from her lips make it even harder to say no this time around, but this time I manage to resist. 

"Sorry kiddo, this one I need to handle myself. You might get hurt if you try to put those hands to work along the smoke." 

In my words and her face, we both know I was lying. If she can use a blow torch, a little smoke wouldn't hurt her. If it wasn't for such a peaceful time, I bet her skills would be like that of my Lana. Somehow, I thought of the same look my Lana gave me when I had to bid her farewell. I can't afford to see that look again. 

So, I gave her a similar promise that I made not too long ago.

"Hmm alright tell you what Lana," her face rises from the grass's tips to reach my eyes. "If I can get the smoke to clear out by sunset, then you can come and assist me." 

The sun begins to beam from her eyes as she finally shows off those two missing front teeth. For a brief moment, all that baggage is lifted from my soul, leaving me to smile in its place. She then asks me if I want to see something she's built. That red cap almost falls off once I say yes. 

Somehow, she grabs my metal hand as I manage to turn off the engine to make it not look like a weapons factory and then leads me back to the sliding door. Entering the kitchen, Lincoln stops us halfway inside. Eddy seems to be no longer with him and to my surprise, all he gives us is a cheeky smile.

"Now where might my little grease monkey be heading off to?" 

"Oh, hey Lincoln," Lana says barely keeping her excitement in check. "I met your friend Joseph, the one who you told me about and I was going to show him some of my creations since he is a wielder too. He even let me wield on a piece of the cool thingy that he's working on outside."

"Did he now?" Lincoln chuckles. "I bet you did a good job on it."

"You bet. He will even let me do more if he can clear all the smoke by sunset." After that for the first time, Lincoln's eyes shot me a look; I nod assuring him otherwise. Lana doesn't even seem to notice as she continued "He even had a friend make that metal arm casket thingy, it's so cool."

"Hmm, indeed it is quite an interesting contraption you have there. How did your friend make it?" 

That voice. The same voice that greeted me from the shadows when I first awoke with this arm. Now she does it again, but this time, I can exactly see her at the same table Lincoln and Eddy were once at. 

She still has her short shaggy hair and thickened frames. Judging by the other two I've met, I figured it would be as such when I finally meet her. Maybe I'm just used to seeing her in a lab coat but seeing her in a pine green turtleneck and plum-colored pants have my eyes blink twice. One thing that remains is that same dreaded smirk I've seen over a thousand times. It's no different as she waits for my response.

"Well, nothing much to it really." Just simple paint and a metal casing for my outfit."

"Hmph even from here I can see the wiring in between the gold." Her eyebrows raise. "Makes it more technical from my eyes."

"Hmm, maybe you should get new frames, then your vision might be less foggy because I can assure you that this is a piece of detail for my costume. I assume Lincoln has mentioned it."

"Perhaps he has, though your story needs a little bit more fine-tuning if you ask me." There it is. That dreaded smirk shoots past my eyelids every time. The one I always see her kind give. The fact that she doesn't even flinch starts to make my blood boil.

"I don't think I asked."

"Maybe you should. Even I can form a more intriguing story than that." Only if she knew the irony of what she said. 

Still, while my blood boils those frames can see right through me, now it's only a matter of time before she would want to let me know such. I'm her hostage and she knows it. Even Lincoln looks at me to see what I would do next. What no one could expect is for Lana to slide in front of me like a helpless animal.

"Come on Lisa, why do you have to suck the fun out of everything?" She yells with the cutest howlers. "Why can't you accept that someone can be just as smart as you."

Lana's defense being quite noble as it is, Lisa only tries to contain her laughter through that smirk. 

"Say Lana why don't you go get the things you were going to show Joseph from your room? We'll keep him company until you return." 

Lincoln then pats her on the head and we all watch her fly towards and up the stairs. Even now she still reminds me of what I left behind. A little girl, full of hope and brightness even in the face of war itself. Reminds and insures me that it's something I plan to keep.

"Hmm, it seems you and Lana get along quite well," Lincoln says, leading me further into the kitchen.

"Why yes, she's...quite talented, and... I can see she's a good kid."

Lincoln's eyes sway to me for a quick moment as he says, "Ah yeah she is, isn't she?" 

I swear I don't see why my face is appealing to these Foliums. To where they are always reading it like a book. Though this time, I doubt he even realizes that he's doing so. So far, he must go yet he's so close to greatness. A dilemma I'm all too familiar with.

"Hmph, a good kid she might be, but a lawyer, I have my doubts" Lisa mutters from her tablet. Looking at her, she's taking notes from Buzzard, or most likely Buzzard was taking notes from her. My eyes squint at hers yet she doesn't care to notice. Lincoln does.

 "Don't mind Lisa, she gets a bit cranky when her studying is interrupted," He utters to me. 

"I wouldn't call it studying elder brother. It's more of a preparation of future endeavors for achievements."

"You could just say studying like the rest of us, you know." 

Like the many times, I've seen Buzzard's eyes sink back into his tablet, hers do the same with the only difference being the tiny grumbles that pass her and hit the fridge as Lincoln hands me a glass of water. 

I look like a madman, chugging the water down my throat as Hardcase does to DBs. It's hard to think about how I've been in battles in worse conditions, yet I have to remember I'm only human. Contrary to what my left arm tells me. 

I spring my head up faster than my skull can take from my drinking when my ears pick up a familiar hint of music blasting past the wooden front door. Rango de Gato. A rock and roller that turns music into pieces of art. In my time we call him the fastest stringer west of the valley. I would always tune his western showdowns with the strings of my battle-ax. 

The voice that sings to his words slaps a reminder of life itself; my life. That voice I can tell takes honey from the bees and tastes familiar. That sweetness has both Lisa and Lincoln's rolling their eyes.

"I swear if Luna doesn't stop blasting her music every time she comes home." Lisa has her head against the tablet, but I pay no mind to the comments or her actions, only the name she uttered from that sea of words. 

As my ears taste the voice that came closer to the door, I began to sweat on the inside, a river overflowing every corner of my brain that it could, remembering the images of her within the sunsets back home.  

My muscles squeeze themselves, reopening a wounded heart. It feels like I'm not breathing, only uttering the name as her shadow stops at the front door. 

Luna...